Committee of Concerned Scientists

The Committee of Concerned Scientists (CCS) is a human rights organization composed of scientists, engineers, and scholars who promote academic and personal freedom for their colleagues worldwide. The Committee supports the rights of scientists to collaborate on research and share data, travel to conferences and meetings, and emigrate if they choose. More broadly, CCS advocates human treatment of all individuals and government compliance with human rights agreements.

The group began in 1972 as an ad hoc committee of scientists based in New York City and Washington DC. It originally concentrated on helping Soviet colleagues, especially refusenik scientists. The term refusenik refers to citizens of the USSR who applied to leave the country and were denied exit visas. Most refusenik scientists were refused on the grounds of possessing "state secrets" that they might share with foreigners. They often lost their jobs at universities and research facilities and were barred from attending scientific conferences. Some were stripped of academic titles, forced to work in labor camps, or charged with parasitism when they could not find work. Persecution was especially harsh for Jewish scientists, who often faced anti-Semitism in addition to the refusenik stigma.

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